You Can't Break Me
by Lexicon04
Summary: When the Avengers wake up alone, in the dark and completely paralyzed, they are forced to watch Steve be tortured to death by an old friend. Because Steve is the weak link, the chink in the armor-you target him, and everything falls apart.
1. Chapter 1

When he woke up, Tony had no idea where he was or how he got there, and his head hurt like hell.

That wasn't unusual at all.

When he saw that the room was mostly dark and smelled like blood and he wasn't hungover as previously thought, he got a strange, uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach.

When he saw his team next to him, all drugged and unconscious, he started to feel a bit anxious.

But when he saw Steve strapped to a table and blood oozing from a horrible looking wound on his temple, he went into a full-scale panic. Steve was always there, always dependable.

Steve was supposed to get them out of here. He wasn't supposed to be the most vulnerable.

The sudden swap scared Tony, which he didn't like to admit.

"Hey, guys. Um. Is anybody awake yet?"

Silence.

"Not even you, Legolas? Natashalie? Aren't you supposed to be trained to resist this kind of stuff? Come on, don't leave me in the dark, guys. At least give me Pepper on the phone. Even she would know where I am, because she'd be bossing Nick Fury around like a boss trying to find me."

"Shhh!" someone hissed.

"Thank god, I thought I was going to have to defeat the bad guys on my own." Tony said, relieved.

"Tony, be _quiet_!" Natasha's low voice hissed. It came from Tony's left, but he could just barely see her red hair, darkened by shadows.

After a grand total of five seconds in silence, someone else said, "So, how do we get out of here?" Tony figured it was Clint.

Natasha's irritable answer cracked like a whip in the silence. "I need to be able to see first!" Then, "Oh."

"Oh? What do you mean, 'oh'?" Tony said indignantly.

"Well, look at Steve..." she said in a strangled voice.

"Oh." Tony said, trying to sound indifferent and way more calm than he actually was. "Well, I guess he's looking pretty bad."

"No shit, Sherlock." Steve muttered hoarsely.

"Did you just swear?" Tony asked suspiciously.

"Yes."

"And actually used a remotely modern-ish reference?"

"Yes."

"I just decided I like you." Tony announced.

Steve laughed, but it quickly died out. He tugged at the straps, then winced.

At this point, Tony was wondering why Steve didn't just break the bonds strapping him to the table (leather, really?). Then, when he saw blood flowing from the places the straps touched Steve's skin, he realized there were sharp metal teeth on the inside of the leather.

Steve couldn't escape, no matter how much he wanted to. It would rip his skin to shreds.

"Jesus Christ, Cap." Tony breathed. Steve made that "I-told-you-so" look that Tony usually hated. Right now, he couldn't care less.

"We've gotten out of worse situations, right?" Clint asked hopefully.

"Yeah. Usually with Steve's help." Natasha answered, confirming Tony's worst fears.

"Oh, god, we are never getting out of here. I'll never have a McDonalds hamburger again. I'll never get to embarrass Steve again. And, you know, that bench in Central Park that he found... it wasn't so bad after all. I'll never get to work on super secret stuff in my lab and drive Pepper crazy. Holy shit, Pepper! She's going to kill me for dying! What if she hates me forever and never thinks of any of the good memories? What if she's pregnant and I'll never get to meet my kid? What if..."

"Please don't let me die listening to that, Tasha." Clint begged.

"Hey! The tabloids would go crazy if they would have heard all of that!" Tony protested.

"You're full of yourself." Clint decided.

"Whatever. Just remember that you're rejecting extremely valuable information that would sell for like a billion dollars on eBay."

"Would not!"

"Would too!"

"Would not!"

The billionaire's next remark, which was going to be quite brilliant by the way, was interrupted by a strange half-cough, half-laugh coming from Steve's direction.

"You should hear yourselves." Steve rasped, the barest hint of a grin on his face. "Arguing about eBay in the face of death."

"Since when have we decided to give up?" Thor piped up. Apparently he'd been awake the whole time. Tony silently respected the god's newfound superpower of being able to keep his mouth shut.

"Since we all woke up sitting paralyzed in these chairs and Steve ended up strapped to a table. With leather straps, no less." Clint said approvingly.

Tony hadn't noticed the paralysis factor in Clint's description until now. Now, he realized he couldn't feel his arms, or legs. In fact, Tony couldn't feel anything up to his neck, which increased his sense of panic by 79% where it had previously been 21%.

In other words, he was in full-scale terror mode. "Oh my god. I can't move. I can't move."

"Calm down, Tony." Steve rolled what little of his eyes the Avengers could see.

"I will not calm down!" Tony cried. "My rights as a human being have been violated!"

"Um, Tony. I don't think the American Constitution covers people who have been paralyzed against their will." Natasha said.

"It doesn't." Steve pointed out. Somehow, hearing it from the boy scout of the group made it more official.

"Fine. I'll have to resort to plan B." Tony declared.

"Do I even want to know what Plan B is?" Natasha asked.

"Bribe everyone in the American government to let me rewrite the Constitution!" Tony said proudly.

Silence.

Dead silence.

In Steve's mind, the silence was due to the fact that America was doomed if Tony was actually serious about that particular plan.

Finally, Clint squeaked, "That's not actually a bad idea."

"I'll help you." Natasha decided.

"I will do anything that I can to assist you in your mission to destroy the American seat of government." Thor vowed.

"I'll be your assassin." Clint offered. "I'm sure all the non-compliant senators can be dealt with easily."

"Are we hitting the Pentagon or the White House first?" Natasha inquired.

"Guys!" Steve interrupted, horrified. "You can't just..."

"Who says I can't? I'm a billionaire." Tony said proudly.

"That doesn't give you a ticket to do anything you want! You can't even move yet!" Steve hissed.

"Don't remind me." Tony muttered, and the light feeling faded.

So the Avengers sank into a depressed silence.

It was an unbearable, tense silence, with too many questions hanging over their heads. Nobody even tried to talk, not even Tony. No one could thing of a thing to say anyways.

So they waited, with nothing else better to do.

"Thank god, I thought you'd never shut up." A voice snarled, coming from somewhere behind Steve and startling the rest of the team out of their reverie.

Natasha's eyes went wide. Tony figured she knew the voice behind all this, and it wasn't good.

Steve started struggling, at first making a valiant attempt to ignore the pain and then slumping down on the table, gasping. The voice behind him laughed cruelly.

"Now you know what it feels like, Steve. To be _trapped._" He spit the last word out with a degree of bitterness Tony had never heard before.

"What are you talking about?" Steve asked, confused.

When the ma stepped out into the light, Steve gasped. "_Bucky?_"

* * *

**Muahaha... not even two chapters into the story and I've already presented you with a cliffhanger! )**

**Sorry this chapter was fairly boring, it was mostly setting the pace. The next chapters will be more interesting, I promise. I tried to give you some humor... think I failed :P But hey, I tried, right? **

**Just to clear somethin' up really quick, this will most likely be a short multi-chapter. 3-5 chapters as the min/max. **

**Hope you enjoyed this, despite the boring filler of an opening chapter. Yeah, this will get me reviews. :P But seriously, tell me what you think. I appreciate constructive criticism- in fact I welcome it because it makes me a better writer. Just no flames, please. I respond to reviews personally, if I like what you reviewed.**

**-Lexie-**


	2. Chapter 2

**Finally! An update!**

**Umm... I don't really have an excuse for this one, I'm just lazy. So, so sorry guys- hope you don't hate me or anything :) Hopefully this nice long chapter makes up for it. Plus it's got lots of action. **

**So, just a fair warning before you start reading. This story is rated M for a reason, mainly descriptions of torture and psychological breakdowns- so, if you're squeamish or don't have a strong stomach you most definitely should not read. Also this chap may or may not bring a few tears. So hold tight.**

**Thanks for all the favs, reviews and alerts! I never expected that kind of response! You guys rock my world. :DDD **

**firedragongirl- **Funnily enough, I was thinking the same thing about Bucky. But hey, if you wanna do hurt!Steve right, you have to break him all the way. I'm so evil :D

**Capsicle4eva- **Aww, thank you :') hurt!Steve is one of my favorites, too. And yes, this story includes the Winter Soldier-my favorite!

**iWriter42- **Err... have to agree with you on that one :o But the rest of it will be mostly dark without the humor, so hopefully I do that right. Tell me?

**FudoTwin17- **Sorry to keep you waiting! Really, I feel so guilty. Here's another chapter, hopefully improved and at a more decent length.

**Kitsu63- **Thank you! Here's the next chapter, ready to go :)

**I forgot to do one of these in the first chapter, SO.**

**DISCLAIMER: I do not own the rights to Marvel or any of these characters. Yet.**

* * *

In a spurt of silver quicker than lightning, a long gash opened up in Steve's chest, causing blood to soak through his shirt. He gasped, the pain stunning him speechless.

"That's not my name." He growled.

"Wha... what are you talking about?" Steve said, utterly bewildered.

"Don't pretend you don't know!" he roared. Another flash of silver, another bleeding stripe across Steve's chest.

Tony felt like he might be sick. His whole body would have ached if not for the numbing paralysis that kept him from ripping mysterious man to shreds.

"I don't... I don't know what... Bucky?" Steve sounded like a broken record. He also sounded hopelessly lost and about fifteen years younger. Like a frightened child. Tony wondered why Steve wasn't showing more resistance, or more reluctance to give in.

The man Steve called Bucky was now inspecting him, as if deciding which parts were the best to break first. It was terrifying, the way he looked at Steve. Cruel, and sadistic. But the most horrifying thing about it was the absolute mercilessness, the cold emptiness. Bucky, or whoever he was, would never regret this.

His hand curled around Steve's ankle, and Tony noticed that his whole arm was made of metal, maliciously shining in the dim light. Suddenly his hand crushed downwards, and Tony heard the sickening _snap _of the bone.

Steve screamed.

As long as Tony lived, he would never forget that scream. It was the sound of pure agony, heartbreak, and horror.

It made Tony want to die. He wanted to curl up in a corner and feel death sucking the strength from his limbs. Because that scream echoed in his ears long after the sound had faded, and would forever haunt his nightmares, his ever waking moment.

"Bucky..." Steve said raggedly.

Bucky swiftly made a new cut on Steve's cheek, not deep by any means but still trickling blood down his face. Scarlet on white. Like blood on snow.

"I told you," he snarled, "my name is not _Bucky_."

Tear tracks glittered on Steve's face, mingling with the blood. "What happened to you?" he asked in quiet horror, and grief.

"Funny you should ask that." Bucky said casually. "It was all your fault."

"What?"

Another slash, this time in Steve's thigh. This one was deep, possibly all the way to the bone. Steve cried out in pain, the sound reverberating off the walls.

Panting, Steve looked Bucky straight in the eye, a bit of his usual self peeping through. He looked as if he was searching for something.

But he gave up only moments later, closing his eyes as if he couldn't bear to look anymore.

"Why?" Steve asked brokenly.

"Because you left me alone_. _You left me to _die _when I fell off that train. You never even lifted a finger to help!" he shouted, slicing deep into Steve's shoulder. Tony thought he heard something crack.

"I wanted to... I tried... I tried to help you!" Steve cried, watching his blood spurt through Bucky's metallic fingers.

"Not hard enough." Bucky hissed, eyes bright. "I bet you never even went back to _look _for me."

"I thought you were dead." Steve said hollowly, but Tony could see the fight in his eyes slowly draining.

"You know it was your fault, Steve. You weren't fast enough, you couldn't catch me in time. You've known it the whole time, deep down, that the blame is all on you." Bucky said, eyes boring into Steve.

Steve finally gave up and slumped on the table. Bucky grinned in triumph and began to cut Steve again.

"Don't!" Natasha cried out suddenly. Bucky's eyes flitted to hers.

"Please, James. Don't do this. This isn't you." Natasha said pleadingly. Her voice had a softness to it that Tony had never heard before. "Steve isn't your enemy. Let him go."

"Ah, Tasha. Since when have you become the better woman?" Bucky sounded amused.

"I've changed." Natasha said, looking down. "Not that you were around to see."

Bucky sighed disappointedly. "You used to be so strong, Tasha. Nothing stopped you."

"You did." She said.

He smiled but said nothing, already bored with the conversation. His mission was solely focused on Steve, the Avengers were merely the audience. Bucky's former love could not hold his attention.

He yanked Steve's sleeve up, looking at the bare forearm. "You have scars." Bucky actually sounded surprised.

Steve struggled weakly, trying to pull his arm away. "From fighting." He said vaguely. His eyes were starting to get a listless look in them.

"No." Bucky traced the straight pink lines, which Tony could now see. "These are self-inflicted."

Tony couldn't help it- his mouth dropped open. "Cap?"

"I couldn't... I was alone." He said simply.

"I... Jesus, Cap. You should have told someone." Tony said, feeling uncharacteristically ashamed he hadn't noticed. And kind of mad that nobody else had, either. "I mean, yeah, you've been through a lot, but that didn't mean you were _alone._"

Tony was betrayed. Were the Avengers really _that _bad? Did Steve really hate them that much...?

"Sheesh, Cap, it's not like we don't exist." Clint chimed in.

Steve kind of smiled, only it turned into a grimace when it hurt the cut on his cheek. Tony was mad enough that he only felt slightly bad.

Bucky also smiled. It looked terrifying. "Since you aren't so alone after all... I guess you don't need these." He motioned to the scars, and brought his knife to the one closest to Steve's wrist.

He started scraping the skin off Steve's forearm in one long, slow motion, eliciting the most horrible screams.

Tony was sure his own screams mingled with Steve's, but he wasn't sure. Everything had started to blur and Steve's raw, bloody forearm split into three blurry pieces. The world was tinted in red.

Then he passed out, with Steve's screams still ringing in his ears.

* * *

Tony woke up more achy and sore than ever. His whole body was tingling painfully and his head hurt where it had hit the floor. Tony was also sure a live octopus was churning his stomach, because he could barely control the nausea.

On the plus side, Tony could move again. Under normal circumstances he would jump up and attack the bastard who was torturing Steve, but, not unlike the situation in Afghanistan, Tony decided to bide his time. Of course this didn't help Steve now, but it might in the long run, if he actually came up with a plan instead of acting on impulse.

Still, the increasing desperation of the team was not helping his self-control.

Especially when he found out Bruce and Thor were out cold, too.

"Please, James! Stop it!" Natasha begged. Tony hadn't ever heard her sound that desperate before. Black Widow didn't lose her cool. But now she had, and frankly it wasn't enormously encouraging.

Obviously Bucky, or James or whatever the heck his name was, didn't heed Natasha's word and did something else to make Steve cry out in pain. Tony cringed at the sound, then winced as it hurt his stiff, sore limbs. Any anger he previously possessed had dissipated, leaving an empty, aching hollow in his chest.

"Why are you even trying, Tasha?" Clint snapped, sounding exasperated.

"I'm just trying to get through to him." Natasha answered tearfully. "Can't you see, Clint?"

"What I see is a motherfucking bastard trying to kill our friend!" Clint snarled. "And you're trying to _reason _with him!"

"But this isn't _him_!" Natasha cried, frustrated.

"_Are you out of your fucking mind?_" Clint shouted. "We don't have time for your stupid, tragic love story right now!" his hands curled into fists.

_Ouch, _Tony cringed at the burning remark. Then he thought, _did Clint's fingers just move?_

"But Natasha's right." Steve said. He sounded like hell. "Bucky's eyes aren't... they aren't blue."

"See?" Natasha said hysterically. "_Do you see what I mean_?" her toes furled and unfurled in distress.

Tony was _sure _that was real. Then, in a sudden flash of insight, Tony realized the plan.

Clint and Natasha were creating a diversion. This whole conversation, though the emotion behind it was real, was staged. The purpose was to reveal the true mastermind behind this capture, and Steve's torture.

Both of them had been planning this ever since their paralysis had worn off, whenever that was. Their small, unnoticeable movements had been a signal to Tony.

As soon as the epiphany hit him, a smooth voice spoke from the shadows. "_Kill him_."

Bucky raised the knife.

"No!" Clint, Natasha, and Tony shouted.

For the smallest second, Bucky hesitated. The intense blue of his eyes began fading into a darker brown.

A snarl came from the darkness. "This man is so hard to contain." A hand shot out and sent thin, snaking tendrils of blue light into Bucky's chest. The fading blue color of his eyes again became sharp, but vacant. He stepped back from Steve.

Loki stepped out from the shadows, although they remained clinging to him as if a piece of his own darkness had become a living thing. He wielded a long, wicked-looking blade, even worse than the one Bucky used.

And suddenly nobody could move, nobody had any fight left. It was all over, and Steve was doomed to die.

Or live with the scars.

"I'll finish this myself." Loki hissed, then grinned a completely deranged smile even scarier than Bucky's cold indifference.

Loki operated much faster than Bucky did, because Steve didn't need any further breaking. In Loki's mind, Steve just needed to die, but he would draw out this moment as far as he could.

Quickly, Loki cut a deep, bloody X in Steve's chest. Then sliced a series of long gashes down Steve's upper arm.

It continued in silence, punctuated by Steve's sharp intakes of breath and sometimes weak cries of pain as Loki broke his bones. Tony noticed Clint and Natasha getting angrier and angrier rather than more subdued.

Blood had long been growing in large puddles that dripped off the sides of the table, making smaller puddles on the floor. Some of them were even congealing, turning a nauseating blackish-red color. Steve's clothes were all but dyed red now, and the little fabric that wasn't plastered to his skin with blood was peeled back to reveal the horrible lacerations covering his body.

Loki suddenly smashed his elbow right on the X on Steve's chest, causing him to yelp in pain. Tony almost threw up at the sickening _crack _it made.

That crack was the last straw for Natasha, who actually pitched forward in her chair.

Natasha realized her mistake when Loki turned his attention to her, understanding that the paralysis had faded out. She had just given away their biggest secret, her biggest defence- the element of surprise.

Loki wasted no time. In one fluid motion, he buried his knife in Steve's stomach, and ripped straight across, the force of the act causing Steve to tumble off the table and onto the floor.

Both assassins screamed in anger. Clint launched himself at Loki, and Natasha tackled Bucky, who was standing dutifully in the corner.

Tony had no fight in him. Everything moved slowly, in a dreamlike fashion. Clint's furious rage, Natasha's anger with her past love. Steve's moans from the floor. Tony couldn't think, couldn't do anything even if he could find it in him to react.

It wasn't like he expected. If the scenario had been previously presented to him, Tony would have thought he would be in a furious rage, like Clint or Natasha. He thought he would have formed a plan right away, and come out of his paralysis. Saved Steve in time.

He never would have expected to lose himself.

But somehow Tony found himself crawling forward, on what strength he didn't know. He had to find Steve. Maybe he could still be saved.

However, the only fact that registered in Tony's mind when he reached Steve was- _It's too late. _

A sharp intake of breath as he noticed the contents of Steve's insides spilling out from the latest wound Loki inflicted.

The burning taste of vomit as it forced it's way up Tony's throat, causing him to retch and his stomach to heave uncontrollably. The vague feeling his body was burning up.

"Tony..."

Steve. That was Steve's voice.

He forced himself to answer. "I'm here."

"Hurts..."

Tony grasped Steve's hand, clutching it like a lifeline. Somehow it didn't seem out of place.

"I know. It will go away soon." Tony felt like he was speaking to a child. But that's really all Steve was right now- a child, in agony.

"Hurts." He croaked again.

"Look, Steve. Just stay with me, okay? You're going to be fine. Just hang on."

"Don't wanna be... alone..."

"You aren't alone. Jesus, Cap, you never were. I'm going to let lose every malfunctioning robot I know on you later for slicing your arm up like that." Tony threatened weakly. But he didn't really mean it. God, if Steve actually lived, he wouldn't ever bother him again.

Steve made a pained face that might have been an attempt to grin. "Later."

"What?"

"You said later... like I'm going to... to..." Steve couldn't finish the sentence.

"Oh. Well, you will live, if that's what you mean. Dummy would miss you too much." It was true- Dummy had taken a strange liking to the captain that never failed to baffle Tony. But only later did Tony realize that maybe he was talking about himself when he said that. He would never admit it, for Steve's sake.

"Pretend." Steve said.

"What?"

"Pretend... like I'll be there..."

Tony finally understood what Steve had been driving at.

_Pretend I'll survive. Pretend I'll live long enough for me to even see Dummy again. Pretend that you'll really have to set your robots on me one day. I'll be there next time Fury chews us out. And maybe you'll actually get to teach me how to use a cell phone. I'll try not to laugh next time Thor punches you because you stole his Pop Tarts. Just pretend I won't cease to exist in less than ten minutes. Just pretend..._

The words echoed hauntingly in Tony's head. Because there shouldn't _be _a pretend.

He exhaled slowly. "Okay. So, when we get out of here, it will be sometime at the end of June, I think. You birthday is on July Fourth, right? I always thought that was too coincidental to be true. Anyways, we can hang at my mansion in Malibu. Bruce and I can set up a fireworks show on the beach. It'll be awesome, especially if we can make our own fireworks."

Steve looked at Tony skeptically.

"Jarvis will keep me from blowing up the lab. It'll be great, Steve, come on. And we can play some kind of music you like. The Beach Boys. You like the Beach Boys, right? I know you pretended not to but you absolutely did. Bruce and Clint are the only ones who know how to cook something that remotely resembles food, so they can grill the burgers. Sorry if they're kind of burnt."

Tony had no idea what he was saying, or where these daydreams were even coming from.

"Thanks... Tony..."

"Yeah?"

"'m not alone now."

Tony didn't say anything, but at some point he realized that Steve's hand had gone cold, and the parts of his face not covered in red were bled white.

A million things seemed to happen all at once.

Clint plunged the knife into Loki's brain.

Natasha bent over an unconscious Bucky, and whispered, "I'm sorry. For everything."

Thor and Bruce were just beginning to stir.

Steve was dead.

The cave exploded into a million sparks. A hundred razor-sharp knives were pointing at Tony, the sparks settling on the blades and glowing like fireflies. Blood was dripping from the cave walls.

Tony didn't know how or when, but eventually the most terrifying thing yet happened- his eyes closed, all his awareness shut down, and everything went black.

* * *

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**Um.**

**Feel free to yell at me through a PM or review. **

**And may I just say sorry in advance for killing Steve, and making the grand mastermind of the thing Loki instead of Bucky. But I just couldn't do it! (hides face in shame). I love Bucky too much.**

**Please R&R! Tell me what you guys think! Good? Bad? Too dark? Too not dark? Plot holes? Just no flames.**

**I'll have the next two chapters out next weekend. **

**Let me just sign off now and let that all sink in... damn, I didn't know I had it in me to be that cruel to poor Steve. **


	3. Chapter 3

**So, that last chapter really went down well. **

**And this particular chapter is mostly just about destroying what little feels you might have left so that you feel enormously, gratefully relieved when certain things happen LATER ;P**

**I'm sorry about killing Steve, if it makes any difference. I love him too.**

**Thanks for the reviews though! I AM AMAZED! :DDD**

**Megorien****- **Well, if it makes any difference I actually stepped on a three-inch slug with my bare foot two days ago (shudder.) :P

**Kitsu63****- **Can I just hug you? Please? Despite the fact you might not want me to xD

**ImageShine**- Well, it looks like the general consensus might be that Steve lives, or I die ;) So I might just be able to work something out here.

**hardcore-muffins**- ….Hemightcomebacksopleasestayt uned? (LOVE the username, by the way!)

**BluexEyedxWolf- **Thank you! I'm working on that particular glitch… so keep reading, there might be something coming up... ;)

**Capsicle4Eva-** Oh, dear God. Please not the axe. *hold hands up in surrender*

**BumblebeenGlaceon- ***gives Nutella* Cuz Nutella helps a lot with crying. But if it doesn't work, here's an ice cream cone.

**Clint**

Clint was no stranger to grief. His troubled childhood, his brother's death, watching Katerina raped and beaten to death.

But this grief, these emotions, were completely foreign to him. Clint didn't know what made the difference, mourning for Steve or Barney or Kat. With Kat, he felt a bittersweet sadness, thinking of the life they could've had together. With Barney, he felt like a piece of him was gone. With Steve, he had lost a brother. A friend. His leader, one of the only people Clint had no problem following.

Steve, who trusted Clint after a single nod from Natasha.

Gone.

Clint was angry, so angry that it was Steve that had to die. Somehow, he felt responsible for Steve's death, as if Clint had failed some kind of test. The second chance to protect his brother. Steve deserved this least of everyone in the team.

So Clint carted off half of the crockery in the entire Tower and set them up in his shooting range. He didn't care if Pepper got mad, he could replace them.

Clint felt a strange satisfaction as the first arrow pierced the glass. The crystal shards skittering across the floor gave a good visualization of the whole entire team right now- broken beyond repair.

_CRASH!_

If only they hadn't decided to save New York from the Chitauri...

_CRASH!_

If only they hadn't decided to live in the same place...

_CRASH!_

Then they wouldn't have gotten so attached...

_CRASH!_

If only the Avengers never formed in the first place...

_CRASH!_

Then they wouldn't have become a family. And, as Clint knows only too well, anybody he becomes attached to dies.

_CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! _

The last pieces of glass flew everywhere, and Clint slowly approached them, not knowing what motivated his feet to move forward. He knelt among the remains of the ruined dishes, on all fours, glass digging into his palms.

And, finally, with bleeding hands and a bleeding heart, he let himself do what he did for no one else.

He cried.

**Thor**

Thor could honestly say he hadn't known the Captain well, and he regretted that now.

All that time spent on Asgard... he could have been with his team. Getting to know them. Letting Stark and Bruce teach him about Midgardian things. Picking out the movie on movie night.

He had but a few conversations with Steve outside of work. Each one Thor ran through his head now, wondering if he would've ever known those would be the only few personal moments with his leader.

He remembered that Steve also lost a brother.

This created a sort of bond between Thor and Steve that nobody else in the team shared with him. Both understood what it meant to lose someone you had known your whole life, the one person who had your back no matter what.

But now Loki was dead, and Steve's brother... Bucky, Thor remembered... was alive somehow and had tortured Steve nearly to death.

Guilt consumed Thor when he realized that it was his own brother that killed his friend, who used Steve's brother against him, who...

Thor realized that, for the first time, he could not regret Loki's cruelty. Because the boy he used to play with, the man who was once his brother, did not exist anymore. And somehow he had to accept that.

Thor held out his arm, and Mjolnir flew into his hand with a satisfying _thunk_. He raised the hammer to the sky, and the lightning came at his call, snaking brightly down his arm. The soft, yet stinging electricity burned some feeling into him, chasing the numbness away. Thor welcomed the pain, although he was used to feeling it by now.

And it began to rain.

* * *

**Bruce**

Bruce had no idea how to deal with this.

Turning into a green rage monster, okay. Finding a powerfully magic object that could destroy the planet, why not? Saving the world from an evil alien race, piece of cake.

Steve dies, blank.

Bruce finally had a problem he had no idea how to solve. Or even where to start solving. If death were a mathematical equation, and he had a blank whiteboard in front of him, he could stare at it forever and come up with nothing. Nada. Zero.

He often felt like he was staring at a huge, blank whiteboard- always searching for something, never finding it. The blankness stretched out endlessly. He could see it in everyone's eyes- that lost, yet beseeching look. The halls, although not always empty, were missing something. A piece was gone.

And at some point, Bruce realized that science doesn't solve all the world's problems. There wasn't an equation in the world that he could use to work through Steve's death. He had to deal with this the human way.

And where to start?

People often said that the best way to deal is to talk to someone.

Bruce couldn't even remember the last time he spoke out loud.

Nobody had, since... well.

Sometimes Pepper tried, but her attempts were half-hearted and died out quickly. The sound of someone's voice stirred the ghosts lingering in the room, bringing back memories and thoughts that were too painful for words.

On a sudden impulse, Bruce picked up his phone and started to punch in the oh-so-familiar numbers. He didn't know why, or what drove him to it. He hadn't talked to her in such a long time.

_Rinnnnng._

Bruce felt a strange thrill, but of anticipation or nervousness he didn't know.

_Rinnnnnng. _

Maybe she didn't want to talk to him at all.

_Rinnnnnng._

Maybe he shouldn't have called her in the first place.

"Hello?"

Hearing her voice- it made him miss her more than he ever had before. To have her seem so close, but he could never touch her.

"Betty?"

"Bruce?"

He smiled.

* * *

**Natasha**

Natasha had seen many people get tortured. Even tortured a few men herself. At the time it was almost fun, especially that exhilarating rush that accompanied every cut, every slash with the knife, the cold steel parting perfect red lines down white skin.

Later, when she joined S.H.I.E.L.D, she tried to recompense for those actions in particular. The ghostly screams of the tortured men seemed to have finally found her, even though she barley heard anything while she tormented them. Now they tormented her.

Steve's death felt like the final straw, the grand finale karma had been waiting for. Especially since her old lover James had a role in it.

She remembered everything, even though it happened so long ago the memories should be black-and-white, blurry and faded. But she remembers how he instructed her when she was seventeen, how cruel his metal hand could be when it hit flesh but gentle when it stroked her cheek. How he told her love was for children but kissed her on the roof, snowflakes landing in his eyelashes. And then, with blood on his hands, he said that it was the one thing that never lied but he told her she was beautiful, and later those words were the only ones she trusted.

Natasha never felt older than she looked, but today she felt age-old, like she had lived through and seen too much.

And Steve, well. She might have saved him, if she tried. But even though Steve deserved death the least of everyone in the team, and even though she had come to think of him as a friend, it had never been him that she wanted to save.

Natasha looked up at the mirrored walls around her. She hated mirrors. They reminded her of her past, of blood and death and shattered hearts. But these mirrors were infinite, empty. That's what she liked most about them. The emptiness. It meant they hadn't seen such horrors, and in them she could almost imagine herself as innocent.

So she started to dance, twirling gracefully in a way that suited her sorrows, until her cheeks were red and she felt seventeen again.

* * *

**Tony**

As soon as he was declared sane enough to leave the hospital, Tony went straight to his lab after a vague, "I'm fine, don't worry" sort of conversation with Pepper and didn't come out. He just buried himself in inventing and wires and robots and equations, until that was all that his mind could process. He barely responded and sometimes ignored Pepper when she tried to make him eat, or go upstairs to sleep. Eating meant having free time and he didn't want free time. Sleeping meant nightmares so he abandoned the concept all together.

Eventually, though, he ran out of glitches to fix on the suits and new robots to create and different accents to give to Jarvis.

Pepper figured something was up when Tony came home, but making life-sized replicas of C3PO and R2D2 from Star Wars and giving Jarvis a voice mirroring Darth Vader's, breathing included? He had to be insane.

"Tony." She said, bursting through the lab door. "We need to..." her last words were drowned out by an extremely loud rendition of the Nyan Cat song.

_Nyanyanyanyanyanyanyanyanyan ya..._

"Take THAT!" he shouted, with an evil cackle.

"What did I do?" Pepper shouted, hands over her ears.

Tony only just seemed to notice her then, and quickly shut the music off. "Not you. Um, that wasn't directed at you."

Pepper then heard a long stream of shouting and cussing coming from Tony's phone. It sounded like Nick Fury, but she couldn't tell.

"What the _hell _is going on here?" she yelled.

"Apparently Fury doesn't like the Nyan Cat." Tony explained.

That was it for Pepper. She had enough of his erratic behavior, enough of his ignoring her, enough of his stupid, _stupid _lab and trying fruitlessly to get him to take care of himself. Could the man do _nothing _on his own?

She grabbed Tony by the ear and started dragging him out of the lab.

"Ow! OW! Pepper, what are you doing?"

"I'm taking you to the hospital again because you really, _really _need help." She said grimly.

"No, I don't! Tony replied hotly. "I... just... I need time!"

"You've had enough time!" Pepper shouted right back. "You've been in that lab for _days_! I think it's time that you get your head out of that lab and back into the _real _world, because we need you, damnit! We all miss him it's not just..."

Tony was shocked by all this, and almost angry when she referenced Steve. "I never saidI missed him, Pepper!"

"Well, we all know you do! And I think it's time you deal with your team because..."

"_My _team?"

"You're officially the leader of the Avengers now, whether you like it or not, and so help me I will put that lab on lockdown until you deal with this!" Pepper said, sounding more on the edge of despair than anger now.

"Fine!" Tony yelled, which made Pepper flinch. "I'll fucking deal with it! I'll fucking deal with _my _team until you're satisfied. Jesus. But if you send me to a mental hospital..."

"I won't." Pepper said, voice cracking. "I won't, just stop doing this to yourself."

It was then Tony realized how much he had been hurting her with his behavior, and he almost felt bad. Then the weight of everything that had just been laid on his shoulders hit him, and the fact that he would actually have to be responsible kind of killed him inside. But he would do it, he would fucking do it for Steve, because he owed the damn guy a few favors.

* * *

**So, this was kind of a filler, and I'm sorry about that. But I hope it was at least enjoyable and the emotions were real. Pleeeaaassee tell me if it was okay, I would love to know :)**

**Oh, yes, and about Natasha. I know I portrayed her as being a bit cruel, with not caring about Steve and trying to save Bucky instead. But I think that's just who she is, like how in the Avengers she only cared about rescuing Clint. So yeah. If anybody disagreed with that part, review or shoot me a PM. **


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